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Wednesday, February 21

How in hell did a street in Charlotte County, Virginia get named for a terrorist?

Speaking of Jamaat ul-Fuqra (see yesterday's earliest post), last night Pundita visited Gates of Vienna and came across a nightmarish report from Baron Bodissey. Here is an excerpt (links not included); please be sure to read the whole thing if your blood pressure is too low or you have a need to stay up pacing the floor until dawn.
In the recent days The Southside Messenger — a small regional newspaper covering an area that includes Charlotte County, Virginia — has published pair of letters to the editor from residents of the Muslims of America compound near Red House, as well as an uncritical “news” story — dare I say puff-piece? — about the MOA.

Christine, the Operations Manager of the 910 Group, was dismayed by the lack of substantive information in the newspaper about Sheikh Gilani and Jamaat ul-Fuqra. She wrote an email to Averett Jones, the editor of The Southside Messenger, and suggested that he consider some of the available sources on Sheikh Gilani’s terrorist and criminal activities.

Mr. Jones proved an unreceptive audience. At first he suggested that there was no information about any terrorist activities by Sheikh Gilani, that all the allegations floating around on the web were derived from questionable fringe groups such as the Christian Action Network. Only information from the federal government would convince him. If he could be shown any such data, he would be glad to publish a story about it in his paper.

After Christine provided a copious amount of government information, Mr. Jones insisted that he meant that there was none from the State Department, which he considered the authoritative source. When supplied with State Department links, he added a requirement that they be recent documents, not from before 2002.

Christine has now supplied him with recent government documents, both state and federal, State Department and otherwise, detailing the extensive criminal and terrorist activities of Sheikh Gilani and the Muslims of America. But she is convinced that Mr. Jones is not acting in good faith, and will never make good on his promise to publish such material if she were to produce it.

As a result, she has decided to go public with the whole exasperating exchange. She is writing to all her contacts in Charlotte County — local government officials, law enforcement personnel, businesspeople, and ordinary citizens — to let them know that their local newspaper editor has been engaging in de facto censorship concerning Sheikh Gilani, Jamaat ul-Fuqra, and the Muslims of America compound near Red House.

In the process of dealing with a recalcitrant newspaper editor, Christine has managed to compile the web’s most comprehensive collection of links to official documents detailing the activities of Sheikh Gilani. Readers who are interested should save her lists for future reference.[...]
See the rest of the post for the entire series of exchanges between Christine and the editor, the links she compiled, and news on that street name.

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